Richmond dispatch. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1884-1903, 1887-06-28
TUESDAY. JUNE %. 1887.
The Responsibility.

The Rowan county (Ky.) affair has moved
some Of our Radical contemporaries to a
eush Of crocodile tears. While in reality
they roll that bloody episode as sweet
morsel under their tongues, they wall over
what they term the evidence 1t affords OF
The low state OF civilization and the law.
iessuess tina, exist throughout the "back-
woods regions" OF the South. Taking
this Kentucky blood.feud as starting
point, they make occasion TO rake up the
history OF ALLEGED southern outrages and
10 attempt to prove that the mountains
down here are filled with cutthroats and
murderers. The Boston Globe, to its credit
be 1t said, while in novise essaying TO de-
fend crime, administers to its distressed
contemporaries . severe rebuke and conso-
lstlon o. in the same breath. After refer.
ring to some Of the crimes that are COM
mon in large northern cities, Boston
among the number, the Globe remarks:
"There are, let it be reiterated, crimes
which find no place or couutenance among
these rude and ignorant people [of the
southern backwoods regions], AMI bur-
siary, hishwAy-robbery, and all other va
rieties OF stealing from the individual are
most conspicuous in this list OF exceptions"
Again:
"a Bostolisn could get in the saddle to-
morrow morning and ride through the for
ests for 6 week and every shotgun In the
county would guard his person and prop
Nhas haC hntt
holder who should see him passing his
door after the sun had set would DID hlm
dismoUnt and enter"
True. But that Is not all the Globe has TO
say. 1t declares that it "comes natural" to
the people who inbabit these out-oi-the-wsy
sections to moonshine and beat the Govern
rent out OF the internal-revenue tax. Here
the Globe gives the true recret OF whatever
ou,lawry exists IN the mountains OF the
South, taking them as swbole. And who
are responsible for that outlawryf Those
whose organs are to-day protesting 10
he rent and racked in great pain over it.
We have always said that so long as the in
terpsl.revenue laws are on the statute. book
they should be enforced. but we cannot close
our eyes to the TACT that they constitute a
barrier to the progress In large sections
OF country OF education, enlighten
mont, and moral, social, and ma.
terial development. There can be no
question that the "lov state OF civilization
in the moon,hning districts, which 30
ag'tata our Radical friends, would not
exist bad not their party prTpetuated the
iuttrualrovenue system after the necessity
for it had ceased to he. There can
te no doubt that many brave
ard hardy man who is noV virtually an out.
law would bca good citizen he'd not the
psrty Of great moral ideas-GOd save tie
marx .-cluug to the revenue iniQui,y in NJ.
der to use it as political machine and an en-
eIne OF oppression in the interest OF tnat
rariv There can be no question that many
a child now growing up in i'm FRANCE would
at least have commOn.school education.
hsd not tue 6. .. z. fastened upon the
country an army Of "spies and inform
ers." These are iacts-irdeed these are stains
upon the record Of the Republican party
That all the tears our malignant contempo-
raries can manage to command for mauy
generations to cone will not wash out.